This course is an investigation into the history and aesthetics of music and technology as deployed in experimental and popular musics from the 19th century to the present. Through original research, creative hands-on projects, readings, and lectures, the following topics will be explored. The history of radio, audio recording, and the recording studio, as well as the development of musique concr?te and early electronic instruments. The creation and extension of musical interfaces by composers such as Harry Partch, John Cage, Conlon Nancarrow, and others. The exploration of electromagnetic technologies in pickups, and the development of dub, hip-hop, and turntablism. The history and application of the analog synthesizer, from the Moog modular to the Roland TR-808. The history of computer music, including music synthesis and representation languages. Contemporary practices in circuit bending, live electronics, and electro-acoustic music, as well as issues in copyright and intellectual property, will also be examined. No prerequisites.

This course is a creative, hands-on exploration of contemporary and historical approaches to live electronics performance and improvisation, including basic analog instrument design, computer synthesis programming, and hardware and software interface design.

Focuses on musical traditions of West Africa. A variety of musical practices and their cultural contexts are explored through listening, reading and written assignments with an emphasis on class discussion. Subject includes in-class instruction in Senegalese drumming, song and dance, as well as live lecture-demonstrations by guest performers from throughout West Africa. This course is an introduction to selected musical traditions of West Africa. A variety of musical practices and their cultural contexts will be explored through listening, reading, and written assignments, with an emphasis on class discussion. The course includes in-class instruction in West African drumming, song and dance, as well as lecture-demonstrations by guest artists. After an introductory unit, the course will be organized around four main geographical areas: Senegal, Mali, Ghana, and Nigeria. An in-depth study of music from these countries will be interspersed with brief overviews of Southern, Central, and East Africa.

Focuses on Hindustani classical music of North India, and also involves learning about the ancient foundations of the rich classical traditions of music and dance of all Indian art and culture. Practice of the ragas and talas through the learning of songs, dance, and drumming compositions. Develops insights through listening, readings, and concert attendance.

How people make sense of their worlds symbolically through myth, ritual, metaphor, and cosmology. The structure of symbols, the natural and social elements they draw on, their social use, and the messages they convey. Students learn to record and analyze myth and ritual.

Watson and Crick noted that the size of a viral genome was insufficient to encode a protein large enough to encapsidate it and reasoned, therefore that a virus shell must be composed of multiple, but identical subunits. Today, high resolution structures of virus capsids reveal the basis of this genetic economy as a highly symmetrical structure, much like a geodesic dome composed of protein subunits. Crystallographic structures and cryo-electron microscopy reconstructions combined with molecular data are beginning to reveal how these nano-structures are built. Topics covered in the course will include basic principles of virus structure and symmetry, capsid assembly, strategies for enclosing nucleic acid, proteins involved in entry and exit, and the life cycles of well understood pathogens such as HIV, influenza, polio, and Herpes. A review of cutting edge structural methods is also covered.

This course focuses on the latest scientific developments and discoveries in the field of nanomechanics, the study of forces and motion on extremely tiny (10-9 m) areas of synthetic and biological materials and structures. At this level, mechanical properties are intimately related to chemistry, physics, and quantum mechanics. Most lectures will consist of a theoretical component that will then be compared to recent experimental data (case studies) in the literature. The course begins with a series of introductory lectures that describes the normal and lateral forces acting at the atomic scale. The following discussions include experimental techniques in high resolution force spectroscopy, atomistic aspects of adhesion, nanoindentation, molecular details of fracture, chemical force microscopy, elasticity of single macromolecular chains, intermolecular interactions in polymers, dynamic force spectroscopy, biomolecular bond strength measurements, and molecular motors.

Parallel treatments of photons, electrons, phonons, and molecules as energy carriers, aiming at fundamental understanding and descriptive tools for energy and heat transport processes from nanoscale continuously to macroscale. Topics include the energy levels, the statistical behavior and internal energy, energy transport in the forms of waves and particles, scattering and heat generation processes, Boltzmann equation and derivation of classical laws, deviation from classical laws at nanoscale and their appropriate descriptions, with applications in nano- and microtechnology.

Explores the related phenomena termed nationalism: national consciousness and identity, nations, nation-states, and nationalist ideologies. Analyzes nationalism's emergence and endurance as a factor in modern politics and society. Topics include: nationalism and state-building, nationalism and economic modernization, nationalism and democratization, and nationalism and ethno-political conflict. This course provides a broad overview of the theories of and approaches to the study of nationalist thought and practice. It also explores the related phenomena termed nationalism: national consciousness and identity, nations, nation-states, and nationalist ideologies and nationalist movements. The course analyzes nationalism's emergence and endurance as a factor in modern politics and society. Topics include: nationalism and state-building, nationalism and economic modernization, nationalism and democratization, and nationalism and religious conflict.

Relationship between computer representation of knowledge and the structure of natural language. Emphasizes development of the analytical skills necessary to judge the computational implications of grammatical formalisms, and uses concrete examples to illustrate particular computational issues. Efficient parsing algorithms for context-free grammars; augmented transition network grammars. Question answering systems. Extensive laboratory work on building natural language processing systems. 6.863 is a laboratory-oriented course on the theory and practice of building computer systems for human language processing, with an emphasis on the linguistic, cognitive, and engineering foundations for understanding their design.

Today, computer-based simulations are becoming increasingly popular, especially when daylighting and energy conservation are amongst the key goals for a project. This two-week workshop will expose participants to the current daylighting simulation models and beyond, by introducing realistic and dynamic assessment methods through hands-on exercises and application to a design project. Open to students and practitioners.

This class examines the relationship between the study of natural history, both domestic and exotic, by Europeans and Americans, and exploration and exploitation of the natural world, focusing on the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries.

This course examines the philosophical and theoretical foundations of constructionism as a paradigm for formulating and evaluating new theories for learning and approaches to education. One of the goals of this course is to help new learning researchers situate their work within the constructionist framework through readings and projects that will focus on the rich interplay between the process of knowledge construction and the development and co-evolution of ideas, learners, tools, and contexts.

This course is an introduction to problems about creativity as it pervades human experience and behavior. Questions about imagination and innovation are studied in relation to the history of philosophy as well as more recent work in philosophy, affective psychology, cognitive studies, and art theory. Readings and guidance are aligned with the student's focus of interest.

Uses sources from the time and historians' interpretations to analyze National Socialism in Germany. Topics include: the history of racist thought and policy in Germany before Nazism; the Nazi movement during the Weimar Republic; the structure of the Nazi state; Nazi policy against Jews and other groups between 1933 and 1939; Nazi economic policy; mobilization for war and the war experience in central Europe; the Holocaust; and the political roles of Nazism and the Holocaust in post-Nazi Germany.

This graduate level course presents theories, methodologies, and applications of seismic imaging for solving the shallow near-surface (0 - 500 m) effects on the seismic data processing for oil and gas exploration on land. It introduces both conventional and advanced imaging technologies that have been developed in academia and the seismic industry.

Negotiation and Conflict Management presents negotiation theory -- strategies and styles -- within an employment context. 15.667 meets only eleven times, with a different topic each week, which is why students should commit to attending all classes. In addition to the theory and exercises presented in class, students practice negotiating with role-playing simulations that cover a range of topics. Students also learn how to negotiate in difficult situations, which include abrasiveness, racism, sexism, whistle-blowing, and emergencies. The course covers conflict management as a first party and as a third party: third-party skills include helping others deal directly with their conflicts, mediation, investigation, arbitration, and helping the system change as a result of a dispute.

Investigates social conflict and distributional disputes in the public sector. While theoretical aspects of conflict are considered, focus is on the practice of dispute resolution. Comparisons between unassisted and assisted negotiation are reviewed along with the techniques of facilitation, negotiation, and nonbinding arbitration.

This course is a graduate subject in the theory and practice of network flows and its extensions. Network flow problems form a subclass of linear programming problems with applications to transportation, logistics, manufacturing, computer science, project management, and finance, as well as a number of other domains. This subject will survey some of the applications of network flows and focus on key special cases of network flow problems including the following: the shortest path problem, the maximum flow problem, the minimum cost flow problem, and the multi-commodity flow problem. We will also consider other extensions of network flow problems.

This course provides a deep understanding of engineering systems at a level intended for research on complex engineering systems. It provides a review and extension of what is known about system architecture and complexity from a theoretical point of view while examining the origins of and recent developments in the field. The class considers how and where the theory has been applied, and uses key analytical methods proposed. Students examine the level of observational (qualitative and quantitative) understanding necessary for successful use of the theoretical framework for a specific engineering system. Case studies apply the theory and principles to engineering systems.